I just got sucked into reading Amy's thread, and I'm so jealous If I could get 500 things out of here, I would do the happy dance. I'm seriously starting to feel smothered in this house.

If anyone's up for tackling a new one, I'll set the thread up for it!

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OK, so, the "rules," borrowed from Amy's October challenge. Amy, if this isn't ok, would you let me know? Thanks!

"Here is what counts:
anything you sell on the tp, ebay, Craigslist etc
anything you freecycle, give back to the rightful owners, donate, give away.
anything you throw out but I would much rather somehow get the item back out there thats not possible and I will also be throwing stuff out.

If you have a small box of your old college papers in the attic and you toss it- its one item. If you also toss your dh's box as well, its two items.

The old mayo jar in the fridge counts as an item, two separate happy meal toys count as two items.
If someone is doing a can goods drive, give them a few good items, they count!
You old tax record from 1998 counts as one item to be shredded.

500 sounds like a lot but once you get started you will be surprised how fast you can drum up 500 items and then some! I go thru everything when I do this down to the makeup drawer and over the washer shelf.

I'm in. I started a few days ago. Today I've boxed up over 150 things to donate and threw away some and recycled a ton. It is such a wonderful feeling. I am determined to get this place decluttered before the baby gets here. I guess since I started early I really need to do more than 500.

I am in! I have done so much purging in the last 3 years or so... but so much mre still needs to go!
So I am for sure in!
I am going to start tomorrow though because DH and DS1 are out of town for the weekend.

Well, personally, I'm using the next few days to kind of eyeball the rooms in the house. When I first look around, I think to myself that there's really not much I can get rid of. But then I force myself to REALLY look, and that's when I start to see stuff that most definitely needs to find a new home I'm just so accustomed to keeping everything "in case we need it" that it's hard for me to let go. Frugality vs. decluttering, KWIM? But hey, if you want make 600, or 800 or even 1,00 items your goal, go for it! That would be amazing!

I'm in-we'll be unpacking from moving, so that's a good time to toss things we don't need. I did a good job this month, but there are always things that we take out of boxes and go, "Why in the world did we move this?" 500 would be a very lofty goal, but we'll see.

I know already that one of my biggest clutter spots is old paperwork, and it's not neatly boxed up--much of it is just stacked on shelves. So I don't know how I'll count it yet. Ideas are welcome!

I'm also going to be cheating a little and counting as decluttered things I put in my Goodwill box even if I haven't taken them there yet. I'm pretty good at taking it in when it gets full, so if the Declutter Cops come by, that's my story. I promise to take it in by the end of November, though.

OK, I got a jump on things and dropped off 28 items for donation today. I think that's pretty durn good, considering I didn't even plan to start till next week! I think decluttering creates its own momentum, since with everything get rid of, you have just that more room to move, which makes the project easier as you go.

I'm so excited at the prospect of having my house tidy again before the holidays!

So I'm already off to a good start. I haven't actually gotten much OUT of the house yet, but I'm throwing everything that's being evicted into a Rubbermaid bin. Some of it I want to put on eBay or the TP, and that's going to take some time, so I'll need to do that later. Some of it I'm going to take to Goodwill, and some of it I'll Freecycle. I finally packed away a ton of baby things that the little little has outgrown, but that I want to keep "just in case" But I actually got them into the right box in the attic, instead of spread out through the house, so that's a big deal for me, woohoo!

I listed a few things on Freecycle, but no one's taking them, which is weird because they're good things. And I have to decide what to do with a bunch of old textbooks. They're not worth anything, so if someone doesn't grab them via Freecycle, what do I do with them? Just recycle?